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Mountain Home Air Force Base

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Mountain Home Air Force Base

Mountain Home Air Force Base (IATA: MUO, ICAO: KMUO, FAA LID: MUO) is a United States Air Force (USAF) installation in the western United States. Located in southwestern Idaho in Elmore County, the base is twelve miles (20 km) southwest of Mountain Home, which is forty miles (65 km) southeast of Boise via Interstate 84. The base also hosts the Republic of Singapore Air Force (RSAF), which has a detachment of F-15SG combat aircraft on long term assignment to the base and a squadron composed of RSAF and USAF personnel.

Constructed in the early 1940s during World War II as a training base for bombers, after the war it briefly had transports, then was a bomber and missile base. It became a fighter base in 1966. The host unit at Mountain Home has been the 366th Fighter Wing (366 FW) of the Air Combat Command (ACC), nicknamed the Gunfighters, since 1972. The base's primary mission is to provide combat airpower and support for worldwide contingency operations. On October 10, 2025, Pete Hegseth announced that the base would host a Qatar Emiri Air Force facility.

Part of the base is a census-designated place (CDP); the population was 3,238 at the 2010 census.

Crews started building the base in November 1942 and the new field officially opened on 7 August 1943. Shortly thereafter, airmen at the field began training U.S. Army Air Forces crews for World War II. The 396th Bombardment Group (Heavy) was the first unit assigned and its planned mission was to train crews for the B-17 Flying Fortress. However, before the first B-17s arrived, plans for the field changed and the 396th was transferred to Moses Lake AAF, Washington (state).

Mountain Home airmen then transitioned to training crews for the B-24 Liberator. The first group to do so was the 470th Bombardment Group (Heavy), which trained at Mountain Home from May 1943 until January 1944, when the unit moved to Tonopah AAF Nevada. The 490th Bombardment Group (Heavy) replaced the 470th and trained B-24 crews until it deployed to RAF Eye England in April 1944. The 494th Bombardment Group then replaced the 490th, once more training Liberator crews.

The base was placed in inactive status in October 1945.

The base remained inactive for over three years until December 1948, when the newly independent U.S. Air Force (USAF) reopened the base. The 4205th Air Base Group was activated on 12 December to prepare the newly re-designated Mountain Home Air Force Base for operational use.

Three wings of the Air Resupply and Communications Service used the base in the early 1950s.

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